Understanding and articulating teacher knowledge

In 1985 at Laverton Secondary College (Victoria, Australia) a small group of teachers met together on a regular basis to discuss their attempts to improve the quality of students’ classroom learning. The structure that developed and became the basis of the Project for the Enhancement of Effective Learning (PEEL) approach (Baird and Northfield, 1992) involved collaboration, support, sharing of ideas and approaches to teaching, and importantly, the development of an articulation of how to share knowledge about teaching for understanding. This occurred through the regular meetings in which the discussion of teaching and learning was the central focus and was supported by a small group of academics.